Democratic legislative leaders won’t be releasing their plan Friday to cut about $220 million in spending to balance this year’s budget.
A spokesman for House Speaker Brendan Sharkey said they are still working on a proposal and it’s likely they will have something early next week.
Republican lawmakers, who released their proposal on Tuesday, were quick to criticize their Democratic colleagues.
“Democrats have once again let the state of Connecticut down,” Senate Minority Leader Len Fasano, R-North Haven, and Sen. Rob Kane, R-Watertown, said in a statement. “. . . Today, Democrats were finally supposed to come out with their own proposal, but we still have nothing.”
Sharkey and Senate President Martin Looney, D-New Haven, exited a meeting in the governor’s office on Wednesday and said they would have their budget proposal ready by the end of the week.
But it turns out they needed more time.
In their statement, Republican lawmakers touted their budget proposal, which restores funding for state hospitals and nonprofit providers who serve some of the state’s neediest residents. It also requires two furlough days from state employees, it sweeps dozens of funds, reduces lawmaker pay by 10 percent, eliminates franking privileges for the rest of the year, and eliminates $24 million in funding that municipalities were supposed to use for property tax relief.
Gov. Dannel P. Malloy rescinded about $65 million from the budget Wednesday, but based on his limited rescission authority he still needs lawmakers help to cut the rest.
“We live in interesting times — Connecticut Republicans are decrying reductions in state spending and finding ways to keep state government the exact same size,” Devon Puglia, a spokesman for Malloy, said. “The governor does not believe it’s either consistent or acceptable to call for reductions in spending, then decry those reductions. Connecticut Republicans keep wanting to find ways to have their cake and eat it to.”